


Un/Hurt

by PoorYorick



Category: Thor (Movies), Thor - All Media Types, Thor: Ragnarok - Fandom
Genre: Drinking, Fantastic Racism, Jotunn Loki (Marvel), Loki is a bit of an ass, Loki's Hulk Phobia, Thor and Bruce are lovely, in second chapter:, to others and also himself
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-04
Updated: 2018-03-25
Packaged: 2019-01-29 07:01:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,464
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12625692
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PoorYorick/pseuds/PoorYorick
Summary: 5+1 - In which Loki got injured in the battle against Hela and tries to hide his moment of weakness from different people for different reasons. And the one person he tells the truth.(Also let me pretend Sif was there...because where the hell was Sif?)As of 24.March.'18 I added a second chapter that continues where the other left of. Hope you enjoy.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> For Anon who asked for: "Story idea for ragnarok, loki actually got really injured during the fight on as gard but concealed it w illusions, ppl find out after fight."

Teleporting back onboard the spaceship had been followed by a brief, blissful unconsciousness. Teleportation was always a difficult feat and along with hiding the wound stretching all across the left side of his torso and keeping his intestines on the inside where they belonged, it had consumed most of his energy.

He awoke in the semi-darkness of what had to be the lower storage decks where seemingly no one had found him. He appreciated it. It was mere luck that he had ended up here instead of right on the bridge or wherever the survivors were indubitably huddling together, mourning their losses and the death of their home world. Sooner or later, questions would be raised. People would want to know who had brought about the catastrophe that had befallen Asgard and when that happened, Loki couldn't afford showing any weakness. 

While he had been unconscious his grip on the magic that kept his insides - well - _inside_  had slipped. A puddle of blood had spread out underneath him, soaking his clothes and drying on his skin and in his hair. It was distasteful, but he couldn't conjure the strength to rid himself of it. Without means of telling the time, he permitted himself as much time as he needed to recover enough energy to stop the bleeding and hide the damage beneath a simple glamour.  

 

* * *

 

  

1) 

Each step seemed to drive the cursed blade of Hela's undead warrior into his flesh all over again, the pain blinding and sharp like electricity, but he kept going. 

It was night according to the artificial circadian rhythm aboard the ship when Loki left the cover of the storage decks and the corridors were dark except for some motion-activated flashing lights giving directions. Easing his glamour slightly to save some of his magic and redirect it to his injury – even if anyone was about, there wasn't much they'd see in this lightening. Ever since he could think, Loki had been able to make out his surroundings in the dark while others stumbled around, helpless. He now knew the reason. _All_ Jötnar could see in the dark. 

Following the green arrows flashing in the wall, he found his way to the nearest sickbay. If he was luckily, he might even find a safe place to enter a healing trance. He longed for a proper, long healing trance. 

His eyes were blinded by sudden brightness before they adjusted – The sickbay had nothing in common with the quarters of the healers on Asgard with their soothing, sand-coloured walls and wide halls. Here, the walls were covered in white tiles. Metal apparatuses that looked more like torture instruments were sitting on tables beside narrow beds and the entire air smelt of something sharp that made his eyes water, but he barely noticed it -  

A familiar figure was sitting on top of one of the beds, struggling with a thread, a needle and some bandages, her face one of utter concentration while she tried to close a wound on her left leg. 

He must have made a noise – or maybe she could sense him, he wouldn’t put it past her – and her head whipped up before he had a chance to sneak back out. He only had time to thicken the glamour, shielding his injuries from her view. He gave his façade just enough independence of movement to hide his own limp, the sheen of blood and cold sweat and his painfully hunched posture. 

“Lady Sif,” He said, puppeteering his illusion into a small bow in a greeting, complete with a sarcastic little smile. 

She released her wounded ankle from her grip, her lips set into a thin line. 

“What do you want?” She demanded. 

Some painkillers. Rubbing alcohol to keep the infection he felt spreading within him at bay. Bandages. A lot more painkillers. His energy was almost depleted and any utensils that would aid his magic heal his wounds were welcome. 

“What do I ever want?” 

He couldn't tell her the truth – couldn't show weakness in front of her. She had sworn to kill him if he betrayed Thor on Svartalfheim and betrayed him he had. Lady Sif didn't break her promises. He'd be foolish to show her weakness. If she could see him as he was now, pallid with blood-loss, trembling and injured she wouldn't hesitate to grasp her opportunity. 

“Have you come to mock me?” 

He tilted his head and the illusion mimicked him, appearing to think. 

“Not what I had in mind but…I could arrange it, if you’d like.” 

She scowled at him but didn’t answer. Instead she returned her attentions to her attempts to do something about the wound in her leg. 'Something' meaning pushing the needle in deeper and sewing in a crooked criss-cross. Because of course neither she nor the Warrior's Three or Thor had ever deemed it necessary to concern themselves with learning even the basics of healing magic. They were Warriors of Asgard after all and wore their scars with pride. Also once upon a time they used to have him for such menial tasks. He wondered whether they had thought him deaf to their taunts and blind to the smiles curling at the corners of their mouths when he even spoke of his magic. 

He didn't know what was worse – having wasted centuries of his life around these fools or that he had actually felt a pang of sadness upon hearing of the Three's demise. 

“Your needlework was always dreadful."  

She scoffed. “You hadn't come to mock me, you said.” 

He stepped closer, keeping the gait of his illusion-self even while his knees buckled under each step. He needed her out of her and if there was no other way to obtain that- 

“Let me," He offered, reaching out towards the needle- 

A sudden flash of silver stopped him and he stepped out of the reach of the blade pointed at his jugular. 

"Do not ever touch me!" She hissed. 

Loki had his illusion raise its hands. "I didn't-" 

“I swore that I would kill you if you betrayed Thor,” She reminded him. “And once I'm healed, I'll make good on that.” 

“Then please, dear Lady Sif. Feel free to take to take your time here." 

Loki's illusion smirked. If he leant against the bed beside her, then only to emphasise how little her threat concerned him. Not because underneath his illusion, he struggled keeping himself on his feet. 

The sound that escaped her throat was almost a snarl, but she dropped the knife and returned to her attempts to multilate herself with that needle. 

Turning around and walking back towards the door – his illusion shrouding his limp and the trembling – he could feel her vengeful eyes on his back, but he didn't expect an attack. She had never been unhanded like that. Underhanded like him. 

 

* * *

 

 

2)  

Thor tried not to think about any of the wrongs that had kept them apart, tried not to think about anything but his brother alive and well in his arms once again without any pretence between them. For once there were no illusions, no lies. 

He tried to focus on that alone, the solid, warm body pressed against his, but he couldn't help but notice the way Loki shifted his weight from one foot to another and seemed to lean away from his brother's touch.  

But he was Loki – if he didn't want Thor touching him, he wouldn't allow it.  

Thor patted his shoulder as he had always done, but Loki flinched away from him, as if in pain- 

As if in _pain._   

Things clicked into place.  

...The way he squirmed to avoid pressure to certain areas of his body.  

“Loki - were you injured?"  

Thor regretted the question the moment it was out – or at least the moment Loki pushed him away, withdrawing from his embrace as if his brother's touch had suddenly burnt him.  

“Do I _look_ hurt?” He snarled with sudden fervour.  

Things were almost never quite how they _looked_ with his brother, but Thor knew better than to point it out when Loki's temper was rearing its head again.  

With a loud thud, Loki slammed the stopper Thor had thrown at him on the dresser behind them and turned to leave before Thor had another chance to stop him – his arm reaching for Loki's shoulder to stop him even when he was out of reach. 

Watching his brother, Thor saw nothing in his gait that would indicate any injury.  

Dumbfounded, Thor rubbed a strange wetness from his fingers - and started.

When he looked down, his hands were covered in the familiar red of blood. There was more sticking to his chestplate and his shoulder, where his brother's chin had rested only seconds ago.

Cursing, Thor took after his brother, calling his name - but the corridor outside his chambers was empty, Loki nowhere in sight.

 

* * *

 

 

3)  

  

She didn't look at him when he entered, only watched his hands as he poured himself a drink – actually poured it into a glass and mixed one colourful liquor with a few more until he was satisfied with whatever concoction he had prepared. Brunnhilde got a sense of why the Grandmaster had liked him so much. The same obsession with unnecessary dramatics. 

"So. You're back then." 

"Evidently." His voice was smooth as silk.  

She made a non-committal grunt and returned her attention to the bottle of unlabelled liquor that smelt and tasted almost like medical alcohol. Not that it mattered. She didn't drink it for the taste. 

"May I sit?" He asked innocently as he walked out from behind the bar. 

She shrugged.   

"Suit yourself."   

There was only one bar on the ship. If he had settled for alcohol to drown out his problems with, their paths would cross more often. There were however more than two chairs and she raised an eyebrow at him when he sat down right next to her. If she had the attention-span for subtleties, she might think the way he leant over her when he reached for a coaster - a fucking coaster - was supposed to drive her away. But if he wanted to be alone, he had to go elsewhere. Bars had been her territory for longer than the little princeling had been alive. She hoped her glare communicated as much.

She didn't like Loki. Didn't dislike him either. She hadn't been around when he arrived on Sakaar, but suddenly the pale stranger with the Asgardian fashion-sense and the arrogant demeanour of Æsir nobility had been there, intruding upon her territory and strutting around as if he owned the place. Strange accidents happened, people had disappeared, clearing his path right into the Grandmaster's inner circle – something that had taken _others_ centuries.   

And _others_ had noticed – he had made enemies. She had watched, waited whose feathers he had to ruffle to finally get himself killed, but ultimately, she hadn't cared. She had never concerned herself with the nonsense-politics of the Grandmaster's pretend-kingdom beyond what was necessary for her survival and paying her bills (and drinks). She hadn't cared about Loki either until they had been pitted against each other to find the Grandmaster's lost champion. 

She dedicated her current drink to leaving Sakaar.  

Other people realised how much they loved home when they were away from it. Brunnhilde was only realising now how little she had cared about Sakaar. She had thrived there because she had been seeking a place that didn't come with any responsibility attached and now that she had left she found there were no strings holding her back. 

She studied Loki more closely as he sipped at his drink. Everyone on board seemed to bear some traces of the battle behind them – many far worse off than Thor – but his brother looked as clean and healthy as he had what felt like an eternity ago when Gast had sent them out on their mission. 

Except...  

She could swear that she had landed more than one blow to his pretty face in their fight. Fuck it, she had pummeled him with all she had after he messed with her mind. Too hard even for an Æsir to already have healed that quickly. And she could swear that she'd seen him hurt in the fight against Hela's soldiers...  

She furrowed her brow.  

"You look...fine."   

A wide, joyless smile spread across his face and he winked at her. 

"Why, thank you for noticing."  

Yeah. Why did she bother with the royal prick again? "I could swear I saw you get stabbed on the Bifrost." More like half-gutted. 

Replaying the fight before her mental eye, she remembered seeing one of Hela's soldiers plunging his sword right into his stomach, but she'd been too far away to do anything to help. She hadn't even thought about it when he returned, seemingly healthy and in one piece.   

Things tended to slip her mind sometimes, she didn't know why. She emptied her bottle.  

"Illusions. It's what I do," He explained carelessly. "You should ask Thor about the time I faked my death and usurped Odin."  

She grinned. " _You_ should tell me about that." Maybe they could become friends after all. As they said. The enemy of your former king who's responsible for his mad spawn killing your lover is your friend. Or something. 

A mixture of amusement and annoyance and grief flickered across his face, but he did tell and they drank, each at their own rate, exchanging stories from her time with the Valkyries against embarrassing childhood stories about their new king and if some of them didn’t exactly ring true, she stopped questioning the details after a few more drinks.  

"I loved her," She was currently telling - more to the bottle in front of her than to him, because she never spoke to anyone of this. "She was my whole life. And that...she killed her in front of my eyes. I thought killing her would make me feel better. Thought it would...matter. That it would change..." The train of thought had escaped and she looked at him, hoping that he would know what she had wanted to say. 

She hadn't looked at him for a while now. He had stopped pouring his drinks and mimicked her, drinking straight from the bottle.

His face was a pallid, grey-ish colour. Blood was sticking to his face. His clothes were torn, revealing a jagged wound stretching across his abdomen exactly where she had thought she'd seen...thought she'd seen...  

...out of nowhere it occurred to her that alcohol was the most rudimentary means of pain relief. That's how she'd gotten started. 

"You're...hurt," She noted, trying to focus on him, even with her sight was swimming before her eyes. "You look like _shit_. Like someone put you through a grinder."  

It occurred to her Gast would like him much less like that. Or maybe he wouldn't. She laughed. 

For a moment Loki looked at her dumbly, trying to figure out what she meant through the veil of his own intoxication, but she didn't have time for him to figure it out – she needed another drink.  

When she had picked another bottle – the contents were...blue-ish. That was promising. 

She looked at him again, she blinked.  

The blood had disappeared. His face had returned to its natural, pale colour rather than the sickly colour of anaemia. Even his clothes were in one piece again and her inhibitions were lowered enough to extend a hand and feel for herself, but he stopped her before she could touch him. (Even if it took him several tries to actually grab her wrist. There was a lot of awkward fumbling on both parts.)  

"You're drunk," He pointed out. "You're seeing things." 

" _You're_ drunk," She countered cleverly.  

"You should leave and sleep it off," Loki suggested patiently and the hand that wasn't wrapped around her wrist reached for her forehead. She struggled instinctively - she remembered all too well what had happened the last time he had done this – but he was too fast.  

His hand was cool against her forehead and suddenly she felt...tired...so tired... 

He was right, she should go and...sleep...sleep right now...  

"Bastard," Was her last word before she slipped from the barstool and hit the floor but there wasn't any real fervour behind it. She'd kill him for this, obviously. But...later. 

 

* * *

  

 

4)  

The ship was big, but with so many people on it, it was almost impossible to avoid everyone. At the moment, the people of Asgard were grateful that he had come to save them, but inevitably questions would be raised – what had caused Hela's emergence, where the real Odin had gone – and he'd rather not be around them when these topics were raised, thank you very much.  

Hiding with Thor hadn't worked – even the oaf had noticed. Dulling the pain with alcohol had at least taken the edge off, but he should have expected that it would lead him right in the arms of their local drunkard valkyrie. Showing weakness around Sif was dangerous and around Thor it was simply humiliating. With Valkyrie the outcome was impossible to tell. She had no reason to go after him for anything, but given the right incentive – or paid the right price – she wouldn't hesitate either and if she did, she'd exploit any weaknesses she knew of. 

So he debased himself further. 

"We've been thinking," Korg began gently, taking a seat opposite to Loki. The couch groaned miserably under his weight.  

Loki didn't bother keeping the face of his illusion interested – or even moving. His body was throbbing with pain and his head spinning with intoxication and he couldn't care less for anything his second in command in leading the revolution against the Grandmaster told him. (He was still baffled how willing they had accept him as their leader, but gifted horses and such.) The stone-alien didn't seem to notice his disinterest.  

"The revolution was a success and...we're very grateful for your leadership in this trying time."  

Loki let the illusion nod acquiescingly. Behind his façade, he sprawled out in the pillows and looked up at the ceiling. Even if he hadn't had an 'active' part in Korg's little rebellion, it had been clear that they had needed his direction and he was more than willing to give it to them as long as it was to his own advantage. Sheep that they were. 

"And now that we shrugged off the chains of our oppressor we wondered whether it's not time to make some changes and to re-model our own system of self-government. There has been a call to introduce some checks and balances and quite frankly, I support it. Not that we don't trust you.." 

Loki felt himself dozing off. He could let himself drift, slip into a healing trance there and then. Something about 'elections' went straight over his head. It was hard to focus about the strange talk about 'term limits' when he felt as if a clawed and sharp-teethed beast was biting its way through his innards. 

He closed his eyes and turned what magic he had left inside, focussing its energy on the damaged- 

"Boss?" Lokiopened his eyes and flinched away from the stone-face hovering above him, studying him with obvious concern. Loki forced himself to brush the tendrils of warmth aside that lured him into sinking into a healing trance.  

"What is it?" 

"You turned grey and you're bleeding all over the couch. I know this is a bad sign with you mammals. It certainly was for Doug."  

Loki blinked. Luckily, he was too exhausted to ask who or what a 'Doug' was.  

Looking down at his hands, he found them trembling and covered in blood. The second time in one night that an illusion had failed. He was exhausted and injured and now drunk too. He needed to recover. He needed to go somewhere, where there was no one to bother him, no one to see him like this -   

With a quick slight of magic, he teleported away, leaving Korg with a healthier-looking if unresponsive illusion of himself to dote on for the next few minutes. 

  

4)  

Loki hadn't thought when he had ported himself into the hangar. It was conveniently close and there were no auras of any Æsir near it. But finding it dark and empty and quiet, he heaved a sigh of relief, allowing himself to drop to the floor – or maybe his legs had just given in – only to curl up on his side. It was childish, but there was no one around to see it. 

Maybe he could find a good hiding place somewhere around here where he could spend a few days in a healing trance with no one bothering him. The Æsir might turn against him when they noticed his weakness. Thor would pity him which was even worse. He had hoped that at least the Valkyrie would be disinterested enough - and too far gone – to leave him alone while he drunk himself into a numb stupor, but the slight relief in pain hadn't been worth it. The simple act of keeping himself upright drew too much energy to maintain a stable illusion on top of it. Even that rock-creature had noticed his weakened state.  

 Loki cursed them all. Only a few days ago he had been king of the Realm Eternal and now he was bleeding on the floor of a hangar of a second-class space-freighter because his idiot brother couldn't leave well enough alone.  

It was undignified, crawling towards the nearest niche in the wall, but it didn't hurt as much as trying to stand did and there was no one around to see him so he could lie down there and focus his healing powers on -  

"Puny God?"  

Loki turned around so fast, the strain on the wound in his stomach hit him with the force of a wrathful bilchsnipe and he cried out.  

The green monster was watching him writhe on the floor, approaching curiously.  

"Stay away!" He commanded, clutching his chest protectively. 

His words went unheeded and the monster came close enough to loom over him. He tried to crawl away further, but he bumped into the wall behind him and now he was cornered - there was no way out. He didn't even have enough energy left to teleport himself. So that's how he would end – beaten into a pulp by a brainless mistake of nature. If he was trembling from more than just the pain, he would never admit it.  

"Puny God hurt," The creature finally said and Loki didn't know whether that was question or a statement – either way it was obvious and redundant because yes, _evidently_ he was hurt what was this? A question? A statement? What did that thing want? 

Loki said none of that. Because making that creature angry would result in an even messier death and he had always imagined a tasteful, elegant funeral for himself with his body resting peacefully on top of an open pyre, his eyes looking up at the heavens above while the flames swallowed his remains and the mourning masses pushed his ship into the ocean to drift away into the dark unknown. 

"Yes. I'm hurt," He hissed instead and the green thing tilted its head as it considered. "Would you bring dishonour on your name and strike an enemy while he's down?"  

"Hulk always strikes," The monster confirmed after brief consideration of his words.  

Loki let his head roll back against the wall, even if the movement – or maybe the blood loss or maybe the alcohol - made him dizzy. There was hardly a point to appealing to the honour of an animal, but he wouldn't be himself if he didn't at least _try_. After all, he was also an animal, if it came down to it – even if it was hidden by a glamour of pale white Æsir skin. (Although he too would definitely strike an enemy while they were down.)  

One giant, green hand reached for him and Loki gathered his last ounce of strength to scramble away, pressing himself back into the wall as far as possible, ignoring the blinding pain.  If he could only find an alarm somewhere and reach it in time. It didn't even matter if it meant that Thor would see him like this, if it meant that he'd get this...this _thing_ off of him. He'd take any humiliation over this.  

Through a red veil of pain, he reached for the railing in the wall, letting it carry more of his weight than his buckling legs could while pulled himself onto his feet and withdrew one of the daggers tucked away in his sleeves. He never thought he'd die in battle. He wanted to die peaceful, in old age surrounded by wealth and beautiful, doting servants. But if Valhalla was real, he'd see Mother again. Small comforts. 

He had barely turned around towards the creature, when his knees already gave in and everything...everything was _swimming_ , his racing heart pumping precious blood right out of the open wound gaping all across his left side and the only sensations he felt were cold sweat sticking to his skin and agony. 

He fell, but luckily it seemed that the floor was now made of soft cotton. He let himself drown in it. 

Somewhere he hurt the monster huff derisively, but it didn't matter. Sleep mattered. He needed sleep. He was no longer in the mood to fight when his vision faded. 

  

* * *

 

 

+1)  

There were hands touching him – trembling hands prodding at his torso, each touch sending a stab of pain through his body and there was panicked muttering to accompany it – he heard his name somewhere in there a few times. He knew that voice and despite not sounding threatening at all, it made fear coil inside his stomach for some reason... 

The reassuring weight of the knives hidden in his sleeves was still there and he was careful not to draw any attention when he withdrew one, working carefully until his hand was wrapped around the hilt- 

One clammy hand reached for his throat and with reflexes Loki was surprised he still possessed in this state, he dropped the pretence of unconsciousness and brought the blade up to his assailant's throat. 

Immediately, the man withdrew, raising his hands in a sign of surrender. Not just any man – Loki knew  that bumbling innocence. It was the green beast's human container.  

"You...you don’t want to do that," The container said, eyeing the knife with worry. And wasn't that the irony? The man had no reason to fear for himself or his hidden passenger. He was concerned for Loki of all people. 

Loki let the knife slide back into the his sleeve, mirroring the man's gesture to show that he was unarmed. Which was a lie. 

"Please forgive me, Bruce," He said, trying for an inviting smile. 

"It's...it's quite alright. I surprised you," The creature's skin said and its eyes wandered towards Loki's injuries. Too late to hide now. "You look like he put you through a blender." 

"And you are naked." 

It was a poor comeback but it distracted Banner enough to actually look down his own body and wince. 

"You'd think I'd be used to that by now," He said mournfully. Apparently, he wasn't – not that Loki was particularly interested in his misgivings. The man shifted his weight to sit in a way that looked uncomfortable but hid his manhood from Loki's view. 

"I'm...sorry," The human said suddenly, gesturing at Loki's chest. "I didn't mean to..." 

"You didn't mean to do what?" 

There was shame in the container's eyes. Guilt even, plain as day. 

"I'm not sure what I... _he_ did," Banner said, "Or you did. But if I hurt you without rea- If I hurt you. I'm sorry." Ah. The good doctor must have concluded that the green monster was responsible for his sorry state. Loki considered supporting Banner's false assumption and guilting some good-will out of the man, but decided against it. The thought of hurting any other being – even an enemy – was obviously distressful for the man and a distressed Banner was a dangerous one.  

"I got injured in battle." He explained instead. 

Trying to sit up he winced when his efforts were punished by another spike of pain. The pain had transformed from sharp and piercing to a blunt, bone-deep agony that radiated from the actual wound throughout his entire body. 

Banner reached out to help him, but Loki leant back immediately – he refused to call it a flinch – making the other man still and raise his hands placatingly. 

"Sorry," He whispered. "Didn't mean to spook you." 

 _"You didn't."_  

The noise emerging from Banner's throat didn't sound convinced, but he didn't seem willing to argue either. 

"Will you need help?" Banner asked instead. "This looks... _grave_." 

Loki studied him, trying to interpret what he was trying to say. Whether he was offering something. 

"I need time," He said. "And I need to focus on my magic." 

Banner nodded. Then he gestured towards Loki's torn leather gear. "You should take that off. Your wounds are already showing signs of infection." 

Loki glared at him, wondering how closely he'd been examined while he had been unconscious – not close enough for Banner to take away his knives. Or maybe he had noticed them but decided that he had no reason to fear them. 

But Banner was right. He could feel the heat of inflammation building up inside his flesh and when he channelled his magic into the injured areas of his body, he could almost taste the budding sickness, bitter and foul. 

He opened the hidden buckles holding the leather suit in place, but a flash of excruciating pain kept him from even raising his hands over his head, much less working his arms through the sleeves. 

"If you would let me..."  - To his credit, this time Banner asked before approaching him and refrained from any sudden movements. Loki decided to hold that against him too. He didn't need anyone to coddle him. 

He wanted to snarl at the man, to tell him to go away, but stopped himself. The heat of the leather was the ideal breeding ground for illness. He needed it off and he couldn't do it without help. Banner had already seen him in this sorry state. It would spare him the agony of walking out of the hangar and anyone else ogling him. 

"Make it quick," He commanded. 

If Banner was dismayed by his sharp tone, he didn't show it but only nodded and set to work immediately. Loki eyed the human suspiciously, while Banner sat a little closer to him and helped him remove the leather top.  

Banner was a little too obvious trying to be inconspicuous about keeping each of his movements visible for Loki. Probably an attempt not to 'spook' him again. With every movement, the pain flashed white and hot and blinding. It tasted of iron and fear – but Loki refused to make a noise, forcing his jaws together to stiffle the scream building up inside his chest until Banner had pulled the darned thing over his head (taking some dead skin and dried blood with it) and dropped it somewhere beside him. 

Loki let himself sink against the wall behind him, heaving a sigh of relief. The mere effort of not crying out while someone took off his shirt had him exhausted, the trembling of his muscles the only sign of life.  

It still hurt, but it no longer felt as if the blade was still buried inside his body. Banner looked more worried than ever. He looked _spooked._  

"Are you sure you're not going to need help?" 

Unclothed the wound looked even worse, as if someone had tried to gut him – not that it was far off from the truth. The curved gash reached from below his navel up to his chest bone, dark and angry with several ribs gleaming white inside a mess of torn muscles and sinews. At least it seemed most major organs had been spared. It would heal. But it would hurt. Loki aggravated the injury some more by sliding down the wall again to lie down. 

"It will be fine," Loki said. "Just leave me alone." 

"I'm not sure..." Banner looked around as if he was expecting directions from somewhere – of course he did. He was only human after all. They were always in such sore need of someone telling them what to do.  

Banner leant back against the wall beside Loki, half-shrugging apologetically. 

"I think I'll stay around - just for a little while. I... just turned back. Still feeling weak, you know? Wasn't sure I'd turn back at all..." 

Loki angled his head to glower at him from where he was lying on the floor. He knew when someone was looking after him, even if he never thought he'd have to endure any coddling from Bruce Banner. 

"Suit yourself." 

"Maybe you can magic a pair of pants for me, when you're better?" Banner asked hopefully. It was obvious that he wasn't going anywhere any time soon. 

"Maybe." 

He was too exhausted to argue further and he felt he could no longer resist the call of a warm, deep healing trance; his eyelids becoming heavier with every passing second. Perhaps he could ignore it, the knowledge that someone was looking after him...tolerate it even. It didn't wasn't all that...uncomfortable. Not being alone.

 


	2. On Ice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After popular (?) request I decided to continue this. I'm sorry it took so long.

Valkyrie’s head was throbbing. Her mouth tasted of cotton and artificial sweetener. Dried saliva was sticking to the side of her face. If she wasn't dead, she wanted to die. If she was dead then...Valhall wasn't what Bor and Odin had advertised. 

Rubbing the flakes of drool from her cheek, she looked up at the face that thankfully blocked out some of the flashing ceiling lights. But only a few. The others seemed to be moving and dancing around the dark silhouette above her and it made the pounding in her head even worse. She closed her eyes.  

“Do you require help?”  

She knew that voice. Took her a few seconds to place it, though. Right. Blond, muscle-y. Thunder-guy. Lord of Thunder. Thunder-God. His Majesty. 

She shook her head. No help. A drink maybe. A drink would do the job. 

“Have you seen Loki?”  

Ah. Lackey. The asshole brother that attacked you in hallways.  

“He’s dead.” She muttered, her eyes still closed. 

“What are you saying?” Big Brother sounded alarmed. Family, she figured. He didn’t have much left of that, had he? Had to care for the insane, murderous relatives one too. But then. Hela. Odin. Maybe he didn't know any other kind of family. Poor guy. 

“I mean I’m goin’ to kill him. When I get my hands on him.”  

“Ah.” His Majesty sounded relieved. “You’re not alone with that sentiment.”   

 _Wonder why._   

“So you haven’t seen him?”  

She opened her eyes, just a slit.  

“He mind-zapped me,” She hissed. “Again. I asked him why he looked like he had a run-in with a bilgesnipe and he mind-zapped me and disappeared.”  

Thor winced. “I apologise on my brother’s behalf.”  

“That's not how apologies work.”  

If Lackey's behaviour of the last few weeks alone was anything to go by, apologising for him was a task set to keep his brother busy until Ragnarök. Wait. Ragnarök had come. And Thor was still doing it. Maybe he'd be apologising until the end of time then. 

"Do you know where he went?" 

"No." 

“Do you need help standing up?”  

“No.”  

“Would you like to... keep lying on the floor?”  

“Yes, please.”  

"Anything else I can-" 

"Turn off the light." 

  

* * *

    
   

Bruce should have had so many feelings about guarding an intergalactic serial killer and wannabe dictator while he slept. ‘Slightly bored’ and ‘cold’ shouldn’t haven’t made the top spots of the list. But here he was. Cold. And slightly bored. And vaguely anxious, but then he was always anxious.  

He hardly even felt any desire to pull the unconscious body next to him towards the next airlock and do something morally questionable to insure the continued existence of the human race - or any other races out there. Of which were there were apparently a lot.. Maybe because it turned out that serial killing would-be dictators looked very peaceful when they slept. Or maybe because Loki had saved all their lives and such things ought to be recognised. Maybe more recognition in his formative years would even have prevented some of the would-be dictatoring and serial killing.  But then apparently he'd started stabbing people when he was eight. If anything, it was a surprise that  _Thor_ had turned out as well-adjusted as he had. 

At first, the random flashes of gold energy dancing across the alien’s skin (because that's what this weird skinny pale guy was – an alien from another planet and that was Thor and Valkyrie and all the others were, too) (although if Bruce thought about it, technically he was an alien here too. But he really, really didn’t  _want_ to think about that) had worried Bruce.  

Not a ‘Code: Green’ kind of worry, but he did for several seconds entertain the idea of running butt-naked through the ship shouting for Thor to come help. Did Thor know about this? Did he glow sometimes too? Might be an Asgardian thing. Or just a Loki thing. Who knew with all that magic? Thor certainly didn't turn into snakes or split into duplicates. And he had said his brother was adopted. Maybe everyone turned into snakes and glowed when they got ran through by blades in his birth-family. (Although Loki didn't seem all that different from their crazy sister.) 

Hesitantly Bruce checked the other man’s pulse to find a stable double-beat inside his wrist. He also found that the golden flashes hadn’t hurt him. They only left a strange but not unpleasant tingling when they brushed against his skin.  

Bruce decided that there was no immediate reason for concern. After all, he could almost watch the wounds close and the discoloration of the inflamed tissue fade. He was slightly concerned to find that Loki’s skin felt unnaturally cool to the touch, but after all the man was already in a healing coma of some sort that hopefully protected him. Likely, he didn't even feel the cold surrounding them like Bruce did.  

Deciding to risk an argument about boundaries and personal property later, he picked up Loki’s wrinkled cape from the floor and wrapped it around himself. It had hardly had any alien blood on it and it kept him warm. And less naked.  

  

* * *

 

    
   

“And then ‘poof’.” Korg illustrated the ‘poof’ with a wave of his hand. “He just vanished.”  

“But he did seem hale before?”  

“At first. But then he looked horrible. On the verge of death, really. And then suddenly he looked healthy again except he wasn't moving. And when I touched him my hand went right through him. And then. As I said – ” The same wave. "Poof. Gone." Suddenly he looked concerned. “I didn’t kill him, did I? Nice guy, your brother. For a ghost.” 

  

* * *

 

 

Bruce found himself trembling uncontrollably. His breath puffed out in little clouds, hanging before him for a few long moments before dissipating.    

If he had been cold before, he was freezing now and temperatures kept dropping. Bruce decided that something had to be wrong with the heating. The cold was seeping even through the cape he had wrapped around himself.  (And wasn't that exactly what they needed? Transporting an entire civilisation through space in a defunct space ship and they would die after all because someone hadn't paid for heating and he'd turn into the Hulk and hurt innocents because of all things the  _heating_ didn't work what could possibly-)  

When he glanced at the man lying next to him, he noticed for the first time the faintest shade of blue darkening his skin and cursed. Frostbite. He’d thought the strange healing coma or whatever was going on with this strange glow would at least protect Loki from the cold, but clearly it didn’t. 

Unwrapping one arm from the cape wrapped around his shoulders he ignored the burn of cold against his skin and reached for the other man’s wrist to feel his pulse – and winced.  

His skin was almost painfully cold to the touch – it felt colder than the air surrounding it, if such a thing were possible. Cold like the skin of a corps-. No. No thinking about that. No. 

“L…Loki?” 

There was no reaction. Not that he had really expected one. He forced himself to touch the unnaturally cold flesh again and shake the man beside him but he remained as still and motionless as he had before. The gold continued to dance across the wound in his chest as if nothing had happened. 

People asking him for medical advice when he wasn’t a schooled professional was bad enough. But with any magical glowing involved he was far out of his depth. 

He awkwardly unwrapped himself from the cape and tucked it around the other man's naked chest. The bite of the freezing air against his own naked skin reminded him that he was an idiot, putting the comfort of an inhumanely resilient alien (and manipulative serial-killing would-be dictator) over his own. If Tony could see him now he would never hear the end of it. Natasha would simply glare at him. But somewhere under a layer of science and seven PhDs and years of education, he was simply an idiot who cared. 

Forcing himself unto his numb feet, he began looking around for one of the intercom units he had seen everywhere on Sakaar, but in the lower decks of this ship, they were scarce.  

After walking only a few steps, he noticed another reason for curiosity: With every meter, the air seemed to become just a little bit warmer. He’d been sitting right at the epicenter of the cold. Except nothing revealed any potential source of a draft.  

Looking back at Loki, he noticed a thin sheet of frost had begun to form between the unconscious body and the floor underneath it – and if possible, the bluish tint of his skin had become even deeper and something like markings were appearing on his skin, curved raised lines that covered his forehead, arms and disappeared underneath the hem of his pants. 

He was  _so_ out of his depth. 

  

* * *

 

 

The sound of fists rapping against the door ripped Thor from his musings and he had already reached the door by the time he reminded himself that if Loki turned towards him for help, he wouldn’t do so with such urgency (Loki didn’t permit himself such vulnerability, hadn't in centuries, and that smarted. He used to to think he was protecting his little brother. He had promised Mother he always would. But Loki's secrecy that was almost impossible.) 

The knocking persisted and when Thor opened the door, he barely evaded the fist that almost connected with his nose. 

“Banner! You are...” 

He was... 

“… _naked_.” That, too, was now in his brain. 

The scientist looked down at himself, shifting awkwardly. “Yes. Yes, several people have pointed that out on my way here.” 

Thor focussed on his friend's face, refusing to look anywhere below the collar bones. 

“May I come in?” Bruce asked, glancing left and right. “Before…more people point it out?”  

“Of course.”  

Bruce squeezed past him before even had time to step aside, hurrying to get into the relative safety of Thor’s quarters. “There are…clothes in the compartment under the bed.” 

“There’s something wrong with your brother,” Bruce said while digging through the drawer containing whatever clothes the crewman had left behind who used to inhabit these quarters. “I mean...more wrong than usual. I think there is, anyway.” He said, while putting on the first pair of trousers he found, wincing at the typically bright Sakaarian colour-scheme of magenta and orange. “He was hurt but he started healing – and glowing and I thought he was getting better but then…he got cold.” 

“Cold?” Panic coiled inside Thor’s stomach. His skin remembered the burn of Svartalfheimr sand under his knees and the slick wetness of his brother's blood on his hands and the weight of a body in his arms and the fading warmth as Loki's eyes lost focus. It almost didn't matter that it was all lies, all illusion and that he ought to strangle Loki for what he had put him through. 

“Not just…cold. I could barely touch him and then…I know this sounds weird but then he turned blue. I thought it was frostbite at first but that...it was different. And there was ice – I..." 

“ _Where is he?_ ” 

 

* * *

 

The first sensation to penetrate the nothingness, the void (falling, he was falling right into the gravitational pull of black hole) was heat. Dry, oppressive heat. It was weighing down on him, a physical entity of its own - a blanket which he couldn’t physically push back or squirm free off, constricting him, pressing down on his lungs. He needed...needed... 

Water. He'd never been so thirsty in his entire life. 

Then came sounds whispers tuning in and out (he'd been falling forever when he first started hearing the voices, voices in his head, voices from-) 

“…With Asgard gone…” 

"...maybe we should..." 

“…don't think he ever had to heal injuries so severe without a healer…” 

"...how much medical personnel..." 

“…his energy. He must have drained himself…so much he couldn’t even keep up the…” 

“…-ey can’t heal him if they can’t touch him...“ 

“ Thor please sit down you are…" 

The heat underneath his body was becoming more and more unbearable and he tried to shift, ignoring the blaze of pain it sent through his torso and suddenly there were steps and  _hands_  (hot and feverish against his skin, stilling his movements, he  _couldn't move_ ) and a hiss of pain and he struggled and his knee connected with the familiar softness of another man's abdomen. Muffled cursing.  

"Loki, it is me – your brother." 

The voice was familiar, but when he opened his eyes the face bent over him surrounded by a halo of cold light was not. A stranger was with him, except- 

"It's me, I just look different. I'm not the only one, mind you." 

Loki studied him more closely and felt his tense muscles relax. 

Definitely Thor and the sight of his cropped hair and the patch covering his eye brought memories rushing back. Hela. Sakaar. The Eternal Flame. (The Tesseract, safely hidden away inside a pocket dimension on the stolen ship.) 

There was a shuffling sound to his left – Bruce Banner, the beast's friendly face - was standing beside his bed, his hands clasped awkwardly around his elbows as if trying to warm himself. As if they weren't surrounded by sweltering heat. 

"What happened?" 

"You over-exerted yourself, brother." Thor said...carefully. If he were anyone but Thor, Loki would have thought he sounded calculating. "Without Asgard to draw your energy from, your injuries were too severe to heal them on your own." Loki expected his brother to chastise him for not seeking out him or a healer on board, but he didn't. Something else was lingering in that remaining blue eye. "It devoured the...it devoured your glamour to compensate." 

At first Loki's muddled brain thought his brother meant the glamour concealing his injuries from curious eyes, but then he caught sight of his hand twisted into the pillow beside his head – blue with ink-black nails and raised lines leading up his arm.  

Panic wrapped around his windpipe – panic  armed with claws and teeth that dug into his insides and crawled deeper into his chest until it reached not his heart but a spot a little further down and to the left and just below the solar plexus, where it decided to nest and fester and throb painfully. 

When he moved, he felt the skin of his chest stretch painfully. Glancing down at his chest, he saw that the unfamiliar blue skin was held together by medical staples, compressing the wound into a jagged, dark-blue line. At least this was not the day he would learn what Jötnar looked like on the inside. 

He was acutely aware of Thor gauging him for a reaction, so he kept his face blank, meeting his brothers gaze. Not just a challenge - it also gave him an excuse not to look at his own (tainted, disgusting  _not_ _his_ ) flesh. 

"Brother?" Thor asked gently. 

Loki faked a wince, as if lying on his side put a strain on his injury and rolled onto his back. Looking at the ceiling above was more bearable. 

“Even now you call me that?”  

“I felt like you needed to hear it.” 

“You’re a fool.” 

Thor blinked. He looked offended, as if Loki hadn't been calling him that for centuries. 

“Why?” 

“ _I felt_ _like_ _you needed to hear it_ ,” Loki hissed. When he spoke, the tips of too sharp teeth brushed against his bottom lip. It felt...wrong. Foreign. (Not his flesh, not his body.) 

"How are you?" Bruce asked. "I wasn't sure how this...your body would react to painkillers in this..." He gestured towards Loki's general...blueness. Monstrosity. "State. Thor said the biology might even be different." 

"I'm well enough." He still felt as if someone was trying to pull his insides out through the hole in his chest, but the cold took the edge of it. He could appreciate progress. "You can leave now." 

Bruce and Thor exchanged glances that spoke volumes – or rather, Loki realised, they already  _had_ spoken volumes before he had woken up. 

"Banner is only worried for your health. You're being ungrateful." 

"If he truly wanted to win my gratitude, he should have left me in the place I wanted to be – instead of dragging me to the person I was hiding from." 

Thor's wince wasn't as satisfying as he had hoped. 

Banner cleared his throat. " _He_  is in the room by the way," He said, "If you guys want to talk about what  _he_ should have done, feel free to include him in that conversation. And I didn't do it for your gratitude, Loki. I did it because it was the right thing." 

"You were about to  _leave_ ," Loki reminded him.  

"Apologies, my friend. My brother has always been disrespectful with his caretakers when he was feeling unwell. He gets...cranky." Loki didn't know the last word Thor used – they really needed to talk about how much Earth-vernacular was appropriate for the king of Asgard – but he doubted it was flattering. 

"I don't really...care about winning your brother's respect," Bruce reassured Thor, "No offence, Loki." 

"Little taken." It would be unbecoming for mortals to have such unrealistic, unachievable aspirations.  

"I'll leave you two alone. Call me if you need anything and...try not to kill each other. Maybe. This ship needs you. Both of you." 

"You should look after the Valkyrie," Thor awkwardly called after his friend, "She didn't look well last I saw her. Actually, I think she passed out again. In the bar." 

Loki scowled after Banner as he left – if only to avoid Thor's gaze for a few seconds longer. He didn't want to meet his brother's eyes -  _eye_ now, singular - with those monstrous red orbs of his own. He didn't want to see his brother try to hide his squirming and give him one of those tight-lipped grins that he reserved for his rare moments of diplomacy or when he had to hide his disgust. Loki knew all of his brother's expressions. When he was disgusted he would clench his jaw to conceal the feelings always so clearly visible on his face and nervously rap his fist against some hard surface. 

"He is a good man," Thor said and it took Loki a moment to realise that he was talking about Banner. "And he is my friend. No matter what is inside him." 

"It is that naive attitude of yours that got you stabbed as a child." 

Thor chuckled. When Loki dared turning his head to face his brother, there was no flinch – poorly suppressed or otherwise – when their eyes met. There was warmth there and a strange sadness – A maturity that a few years ago he would never have thought he'd see on his brother's face. 

"I've never picked up another snake since," Thor said thoughtfully. "As much as I loved them." 

"Very wise of you." 

"You will not convince me that you taught me that lesson for my own good." 

Very wise that, too. 

 "You know, when Father told me that you..." Thor faltered. "When he told me about your adoption, I...I tried to look for signs. Any hints that had slipped past me." 

"And what did you discover with all your mighty cunning, brother?" 

Thor shrugged. He looked strangely helpless – an expression that looked awfully wrong on this familiar, warm face. 

"Nothing," He said. "Everything. You. So much of you. I...I spoke to people I knew you associated with. I searched your chambers-" 

"You will pay for that." 

"I know. I read your letters and personal notes..." For that intrusion Loki decided he didn't need to swear vengeance. It went without saying. "All the little things I found – your accomplishments in magic, the company and the lovers you kept, the writings you did – I had no knowledge of most of them. And when I looked around I realised that you were not the only one I'd neglected. Mother...father. My old mentors. So many of my friends. I used to be a different man. We both know it. And those years before my coronation...I grew selfish. I stopped paying attention to anyone but myself. Father's banishment served me well – it helped me recognise my errors and change my ways. I regret that not. My only regret is that I was not there for you when you needed me the most." There was more that went unsaid and that Loki could only guess at. "I'm sorry." 

Loki waved his apology away. Thor was apologising for not being there to stop his lapse into insanity, but Thor hadn't wronged him. Thor had just been Thor – the brother he knew, the brother he grew up with. It was this new Thor of the last few years – the one who saw through illusions and apologised for mistakes – that Loki didn't know what to do with. 

Thor had been lied to just as he had. Thor had been wronged, too. What would the Thor he remembered – the one who swore to slay all the Frost Giants – have said if he had known that one of the monsters had been raised alongside him, had eaten from the same plates, shared the same clothes and partaken in the same quests? If he had known what Loki was in those nights that Thor soothed him from nightmares of those same creatures devouring him?  

Loki snorted. Irony he could appreciate. 

"How did you get me here anyway?" 

Thor lifted his arms to demonstrate red burns of frostbite covering them. "I carried you." 

Loki blinked. 

"You carried me?" He incredulously. That was so... _Thor_. Loki barely remembered to feel humiliated. "You  _idiot_." 

"It's quite alright. After a few meters Bruce pointed out that we could wrap you in your coat to avoid some of the...you know..." 

"Excruciating pain?" 

"Yes. That." Thor grinned. "Maybe it's good that Father didn't tell you earlier. You would never have stopped freezing me if you had known you had this power." 

Loki wanted to hiss at Thor that this was no jesting matter or to remind of all the times that Thor himself had sworn to kill every Jötun like the hero he was ("I will protect you from the Frost Giants, brother. No monster will ever lay a finger on you. Tell them that, the next time you dream of them.") but found he couldn't. 

What halted his tongue was the image of his brother - strong and golden even as a child – playing in the gardens like they used to. But in his place was the Jötun; a layer of frost on its blue skin – bare but for the traditional loincloth wrapped around its hips - catching the light of Asgard's golden sun, the red eyes dark and unreadable and sharp teeth in the place of the innocent smile that should graze a child's lips. 

"You were right, by the way," Thor said. 

"I often am. You need to be more specific." 

"About what you said in the dungeons."  

Loki blinked. 

"The dungeons on Sakaar," Thor specified even further. Ah. Maybe he had spent too much time in various prisons in these last few years if these things started to blur. "It hurts. Being lied to." 

"Finding out that all your siblings are monsters?" 

"You're not a monster, Loki. You're many things – but not that." 

Loki dared to glance down at his fingers and their abnormal colours and the raised lines that covered the back of his hand. Experimentally, he rubbed his thumb over one of them. They weren't hard or sharp, but slightly...leather-y. Almost soft. 

"I did wonder whether you knew," Loki admitted, " For a while after Father told me. I wondered whether that was the reason why you—" He stopped himself. Thor didn't need to know the depth of his insecurities. "But you'd never be able to keep such a secret to yourself. You would have told them all, everyone would have known except me...I imagined them all laughing behind my backs." Loki chuckled at the horror written across Thor's face. "The madness is talking, forgive me. They deceived you too – all these years you swore to slay every Frost Giant that would cross your path and at the same time they made you sleep next to a Frost Giant, eat next to a Frost Giant, train with a Frost Giant. When you found out – didn't you ever wonder how many people knew? Who was laughing at your expense? Heimdall surely knew...but then I'm not sure that man is physically capable of laughter." 

Carefully, Thor pulled over a chair and sat down next to Loki's bed. He was stalling – Loki remembered Thor's lessons in diplomacy. He knew how he looked when he so desperately tried to look casual. 

And yet, intent was written clearly in Thor's remaining eye and in the way he clenched his fists in his lap when he'd finally seated himself. 

"It's your truth, Loki. This is..." Thor's eyes wandered across Loki's changed features, "This is your body, your blood – your face. And it was taken from you. It was your right to know and it would have been your right to decide whom to share it with." 

"And if I had known and if I had told you of it? What then?" 

He expected to hear passionate reassurances of Thor's unconditional love for his brother but instead a new expression crossed Thor's face. One that he was almost unfamiliar with. It had to belong to the new Thor. 

"I wish I could promise you that it would have changed nothing. Or even that it would have made me a better man and less blind to the prejudices and tales of hatred we were raised with. But I cannot be sure. The man I used to be...he was different." 

Loki chuckled. 

"Very different," He agreed. "But he was my brother." A brother who gave as good as he got and who was protective and fierce and if not controllable then at least predictable.  

"I'm still your brother," Thor said.  _Promised_. There was a promise in there. "And you're mine." 

 

* * *

 

 

Brunnhilde stared into the opaque, orange depths of the fluid inside the glass she held in her hand. 

"What is that?" 

"Juice. I'm not sure what fruit or...if it's a fruit but on Earth we call it fruit." 

Suspiciously, she brought the straw to her mouth, but it didn't taste...bad.  

"It tastes like a cocktail without...alcohol." 

Bruce sighed. "You're. Not wrong. Try the food. It's the Tony Stark Hangover Special." He looked strangely wistful when he said the last combination of seemingly meaningless words and she remembered that – although he was a strange man who lived inside a green giant and had been staying on Sakaar for decades – that he had a world he called home, too. That he likely had loved ones waiting for him. 

When he looked away - wistfully staring at the stars passing by outside the windows -, she emptied a flask into the 'juice', adding some Sakaarian whiskey to the mix. 

"Where are our two princelings?" She asked suddenly. 

 

* * *

 

 

It was proof of Loki's poor state that he fell asleep before he could have the last word. In fact, he hadn't even tried to blame Thor for his misery. 

When he woke up, blankets and dull pain were both wrapped tightly around his body. His surroundings were dark, but not completely black. 

At some point his brother had moved from the chair by his bedside into the bed itself, sitting upright propped against the wall behind the small headboard, one hand loosely buried in Loki's hair. Thor's head had sunken to his shoulder and his soft, open-mouthed snoring was so familiar it hurt. Not as much as being sliced open by the blade of a warrior of the undead hurt, but in a similar place deep inside his chest. 

His throat hurt when he swallowed – parched dry by the fever – and he turned towards the sink in a niche in the corner by the door, his eyes penetrating the darkness with even more supernatural precision than he was used to. His sight had always been better than those of his Aesir-companions but it seemed they were weaker than their Jötun-counterpart.  

He could have woken his brother and send him to fetch him some water but decided to let him sleep. He blamed his fever for that too. 

Loki found no handcuffs or chains tethering him to the bed – he concluded that Thor's lacklustre watch over him didn't mean that his brother had revoked his unofficial – and inexistent – pardon for his crimes on Midgard and returned him to the state of a prisoner, even after seeing him reduced to this beastly state. 

Mindful not to wake his brother, Loki slid off the bed, wincing and clenching his teeth as he braced himself against a new wave of pain. Someone had removed his shoes while he'd been unconscious – either time he'd been unconscious – and like everything else the floor felt unnaturally warm underneath the naked soles of his feet. 

Bracing himself against the wall, he made a slow and painful progress through the room, each step tugging at the staples and sending flashes of pain up his front. He heaved a sigh of relief – that too hurt, inside his dry throat – when he finally reached the sink and allowed himself a moment to catch his breath, leaning against its edge to steady himself. 

He wished he hadn't flinched at the signal hum alarming him that one of the electric devices in the room had been activated – firstly, it was embarrassing, and secondly, sudden movements hurt. A screen lit up above the sink from which a light-blue, unfamiliar reflection looked back at him, ruby-coloured eyes studying him with an expression of distant horror. His face. His own, real face that he'd never seen before. Of course. An electronic mirror. 

Behind him, Thor was still snoring peacefully. 

He reached inside himself, reached for the magic always simmering beneath the surface, but the familiar energy refused to build up underneath his skin and the green glow flickered and faded again – a sensation like missing a step on the stairs – leaving behind the same countenance to look back at him. The exhaustion made him lightheaded. 

The tap activated with a wave of his hand before an invisible sensor and Loki forewent the paper cups stacked beside the sink, drinking the water directly from small jet without ever taking his blood red eyes off the mirror.  

The voices of dozens of his teachers echoed inside head.  _Never take your eyes off the enemy._   

He choked painfully when the water froze inside his own throat and his instinctive attempt to cough the ice back up sent bursts of sharp pain through his body that had him curling over the sink.  

He barely felt his knees buckle before he lost balance, too quickly for him to get hold of the edge of the sink - but he never hit the floor. 

A pair of solid and almost unbearably warm arms caught him, immediately wrapping him in a blanket to separate the contrasting temperatures of their skins. He could still feel his brother trembling from the cold, even through the fabric 

"You should have woken me," Thor said, "Bruce said you would be thirsty. I could have brought you anything you desired." 

"I wanted to..." He didn't know what he wanted. Couldn't figure it out anymore. 

If Thor knew, he didn't say it. Maybe his answer was in the solemn way he aided Loki back to bed, helping him sit down and lean back against the wall to ease the strain on his injured chest. He felt slightly relieved when Thor finally let go of him – he didn't like to think about his brother touching this strange body as if it were Loki's (Except it was. Except it most certainly was not.).  

While Thor turned back to the sink to prepare him another cup of water, Loki wrapped the blanket tighter around himself, covering as much of his shoulders and neck as possible as if he were feeling cold and not just trying to hide as much of his discoloured skin under the fabric. 

He felt like a child, accepting the cup Thor handed him with a blanket wrapped around his fingers, but at least he didn't have to carefully avoid brushing his brother's hand with his own to prevent giving him (more) frostbite.  

"You don't need to stay here," Loki said, while scooting lower on the bed until he could lie down. It was a painful process that aggravated his injury and he could see Thor's fingers twitch with the desire to help. Loki stopped with a single glare. "I don't need a minder." 

"I thought it better not to leave you alone." 

"Are you worried I start hunting for any newborns to eat? Or are you worried that I'm going to find another Bifröst to throw myself off?" 

Thor pursed his lips at the second one. Ah. He feared Loki would make another attempt on his own life. 

"Stay, if you have to," Loki sighed. 

Thor smiled and there was that smugness in his smile that Loki detested, because it took him right back to the sparring grounds when he was a kid with a triumphant Thor holding him down, but just like then he found himself unable to do anything about it – not, because it was his brother who incapacitated him but because back then the world had been perfect and neither of them had known any troubles.  

An entire world that was now dust. 

Tucking his blanket closely around his shoulders, Loki moved over on the narrow bed, making room beside him and turned away from his brother.  

He could feel the thin mattress shift and cave under his brother's weight. 

"If you snore, I will stab you," Loki warned and he could hear his brother chuckle. 

"You don't have your daggers," He pointed out. 

"Jotun, remember? I can make one from ice." 

Loki, in all honesty, had no idea how and whether he could manage such a feat, but judging by his brother's silence, his bluff hadn't been called. He even ignored it when he felt Thor's arm wrapping around him.  

 

* * *

 

 

"Should we wake them up?" Bruce asked, concern evident in his voice. "Thor at least. He's going to freeze." 

Brunnhilde snorted. 

"Will teach him to go around cuddling icicles." 

"Aren't you worried that-" 

He broke off immediately when she wrapped a hand around his wrist and pressed it against one blue shoulder that had slipped free from the blanket. It took several seconds for Bruce's expression to shift from panic to relief when he realised that his fingers weren't freezing and falling off. 

"I knew plenty of Jötnar back in the day," She explained when she let go of his wrist. Immediately Bruce withdrew his own hand, whispering an awkward sorry at the sleeping form on the bed, "The freezing is a defence mechanism. It stops when they feel safe." 

"Oh." 

"Yeah. Guess killing him will have to wait until he's back to normal."   

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Find and validate me on langernameohnebedeutung.tumblr.com

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on tumblr: langernameohnebedeutung.tumblr.com if you got prompts or...anything else. Anyway, you can find me there, most of the time.


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